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EDIT:
Apparently, some readers are failing to read for content and ad homineming that I'm a "Sensationalist right winger."

I'm an immigrant. I'm a 25 year veteran of the US military. I supported marriage equality and gays in the military as far back as the mid 1980s. (I was a minor before that.)  I'm an active supporter of the trans community with references to prove it.  I'm pro-free speech, pro-reproductive choice.  I'm anti-big government.  I'm non-religious.

That's actually the EXACT OPPOSITE of a right winger.

Also, I own several real submachine guns and stuff that feeds ammo from belts.  So I have zero interest or need for an inferior bumpfire stock.

Now, please read for content and actually think.

~~~

Some people think they love it. Some people hate it. Some people think it's just a bit of political maneuvering.

I'm here to explain why, regardless of your feelings about firearms, this little item should utterly terrify you.

Here's the official statement:  https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1046006/download

First, notice the statement is from Jeff Sessions. Now, if you believe (as all rational people do) that pretty much everything that man did was a disaster, you shouldn't be deluded into thinking this was magically better than anything else he did in his crusade to eliminate pain killers, pot and everything except actual criminals.

I draw your attention to the phrase and the claim that a bumpfire stock, "Harnesses the recoil energy."

It does nothing of the kind.  Put a firearm equipped with a bumpfire stock in a block on a bench, pull the trigger, it will fire a single shot only. One. Then it will do nothing. There is no "Harnessed energy." An ACTUAL machine gun will continue to fire until you release or run out of ammo. The bumpfire stock-equipped rifle will, again, fire one. single. shot. And stop.

An earlier device with a spring (The Akins Accelerator) was in fact ruled to be a machine gun, by ATF, who ruled that removing the spring made it not a machine gun.  There was much outcry from the users that their $1000 (!) accessory was no longer usable.  But I wrote about that elsewhere. It's also referenced in the letter above, and the two are conflated, because Sessions is either stupid or evil or both.

The bumpfire stock is a stock. If you are experienced and well trained, it is possible with CERTAIN weapons to slightly increase the rate at which you pull the trigger, by shoving with the other hand while pulling the trigger.  If you're a guitarist, think of a hammer-pull combination.  It's not something a noob does to any good effect.

Sessions' description is literally as inaccurate as saying "Alcohol is a narcotic."

The second claim is that, just like a machine gun, it allows firing multiple rounds with a single function of the trigger.  This is also provably false.  Again: Place it on a bench, pull the trigger, it fires one shot.  The trigger must be released before it can shoot again.

This cannot possibly be defined as a "machine gun" that fires more than one shot per pull of the trigger.  Yet, that is what Sessions has done, via a false statement--a lie.

The manufacture of machine guns has been illegal since 1986. Real ones command a high price. The finding of the Firearm Technology Branch was not only that these devices were not machine guns, but that in fact, they are not even firearms.

Sessions has falsely declared it to be a machine gun, and therefore contraband ex post facto, with absolutely no compensation for the "contraband," in complete contradiction to the experts' findings.

ATFE estimates the device and related industry are worth $200 million, which is tiny in business terms. However, every owner, seller, maker has money invested that is being stolen from them. No due process.  No legislative process.

This is an EX POST FACTO TAKING of private property via a false declaration.  You should be afraid. You should be VERY VERY afraid.

Look above again. This decision is precedent for ANY Cabinet head to declare anything...or anyone, illegal, and subject to theft or imprisonment with no due process.

And worse, it was put in place by President Trump. If this stands, then President Trump has precedent to overrule any bureau, any law, just by instructing his cabinet to draft a false statement.

"Alcohol is a narcotic. Therefore, all alcoholic beverages are contraband and the selling of them is illegal. Shut all the liquor stores at the end of the month. No one gets compensated."

Didn't we walk that path already?

"Pot is a narcotic." 

Oh, wait. The government already says pretty much that.  Great idea to have more of it, eh?

"This house is a narcotic. Therefore, it is contraband and we will seize it.  No compensation. Also, you're going to jail." 

You thought asset forfeiture was bad before?

What about when the NEXT president takes office?  What if President Mike Pence says, "All fetuses are people"?  And then after talking to someone who knows what they're talking about says, "All embryos and blastocysts are, too."

What if President Bernie Sanders says, "All income belongs to the collective"?

I bet at least one of those gives you nightmares, right?

If the courts don't utterly destroy this "ruling" at once, it is very literally the end of the legislative authority.  President Falwell will be able to order that, "Any non-Christian church is a political entity, not a religion." 

Still think it's a great idea, or even a not-terrible idea?

~~

EDIT: and apparently a lot of so-called "liberals" do think it's a great idea, because "guns are bad m'kay?"

Due process?  Separation of powers? Constitution?  Hey, this is about guns!

That's exactly the attitude that got us the War on (some) Drugs.

The Federalist agrees with me. http://thefederalist.com/2018/12/19/trump-administrations-new-bump-stock-ban-legal-abomination/